Creating space for your soul to breathe so you can discern your next right thing.

Let’s Share What We Learned This Spring

Y’all. We have so much to talk about. A royal wedding, Yanny and Laurel, a springtime snow, what your future self needs, not to mention all the things you’ve learned this season. So let’s get to it!

Welcome to What We Learned, where we pause to reflect on the past season before we move ahead into the future. At the end of this post, you’re invited to link up to your own list of what you learned this quarter – be it silly, serious, sacred, or just plain useful. I like to share a mix of all of those.

If you’re visiting for the first time from my podcast The Next Right Thing, welcome! We do this every quarter and will share our next list (What We Learned in Summer) on Friday, August 31. Grab your free printable list here to help you keep track and plan to share with us then. Now you can also share your list on Instagram using #wwlcommunity.

Here are things I learned this spring in no particular order:

1. I don’t mind a March snow.

That’s easy for me to say because it’s rare here in North Carolina. But it snowed in the middle of March this year and I found myself thrilled as I watched it fall down fast out my window, one last quieting, a final hush before spring.

2. On Downton Abbey, they never washed their costumes.

So basically they stunk all the time. They did have removable patches in the armpits, but I don’t like to think about this and also could that possibly have helped? This is a random fact I can’t forget.

3. Of all the gradual things in this life, watching as your kids grow up is perhaps the most exceptional.

The girls start high school in the fall and it feels equally shocking and like the most normal thing in the world. I have surprised myself with my current lack of overwhelm at this new impending life stage. Let’s see if it lasts.

4. If there’s something I miss from the past, I can find ways to invite it back into my life.

5. Your future self needs you to plan things before you think you need them.

One of the reasons those “old days of blogging” were so great was because it was how I met some of my current closest friends. Shannan Martin and I have been getting together for a writing/working/eating/talking weekend for five years now. This one was the hardest to find a date that works but we did it anyway and I’m so glad.

6. When it doubt, take a walk.

Part two of that last one is Writing Day 1 in Chicago was a wash. It was our final day of our hope*writers launch so while I thought I could disconnect all day, that was unrealistic. I also just needed some time to settle in.

When I got back to my hotel room just before lunch, I was in a fantastic mood, ready to work. Sometimes it’s best to start first thing in the morning, but other times you need a little walk through the city to remember to see things from a new perspective.

7. “When the ego swells, the soul shrivels.”

Thank you, Dallas Willard, for these 7 words I’ll never forget.

8. If you have to decide between several things, pick what you like then see how it grows.

10. We’ve learned what level of distraction and obsession we can (or cannot?) endure.

You guys, we survived Yanny and Laurel and a Royal Wedding in the same week! I can’t believe the stock market didn’t crash or something. It’s a wonder we got any work done at all that week. I’m so proud of us.

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I keep track of what I’m learning by using my seasonal reflection lists. You can get your own printable lists for tracking your reflections by signing up right here. If you’re new around here and want to know what, how, and tools to track what you’re learning, check out A New Page for Your Bullet Journal.

Ok so outer garments were rarely washed ever and there has in fact been a somewhat scientific study about washing vs not washing underclothes, of which there was an insane amount (of underclothes) back in the day. Armpits would be the most unprotected part if they weren’t wearing long sleeved shifts (which were possibly going out of fashion-Downton is outside of the time period I self-studied when a writer). Also, the original source is the Daily Mail, for goodness sake. And somewhere I have a manual for a valet doing laundry. So, there’s that. I will add the study to my submission for the link up, provided I can find it… hope this reassures.

Imagine being alive in the “olden days” and owning maybe two dresses and hardly ever or never washing them! On the other hand, imagine having to wash with a copper tub and a paddle and a scrubbing board!
I choose not washing 😉

Number 3-perfectly said. So weird, isn’t it-shocking but also completely normal. My son is 26 now and lives in another city and I can’t count the times I see him in a year because it would be so few I’d end up in a puddle on the floor, and yet this is how it goes. SMH.

I’m guessing that not washing the costumes made it all even more authentic? Can’t imagine why else they would do that. Chicago in the spring is one of my favorite places. One of the few things I miss about living in NC now. And I love #7. You should put that on a B&W mug!

I also enjoyed the snow we had in March. It was such a strange winter, that I felt it really needed to go out with a bang. Love your mug collection! I have a collection of big “soup” mugs that I’ve been accumulating over the last several years. I adore them all. Storing them, however, has become a challenge. I didn’t watch (or particularly care about) the royal wedding and I was a Laurel girl, but on the Green Lantern/Brainstorm one, I’m hearing both, depending on which ear the audio is closer to. Weird… Hope you have a great summer!